NASS Crop Value Report Pt 2
I'm Bob Larson. We talked yesterday about the 2017 USDA-National Ag Statistics Service numbers for production value of crops from the state of Washington coming up 4-percent from the previous year at $10.6-billion.
NASS Northwest Regional Director Chris Mertz says one of the big moves, coming in at number seven on the list, was hops that had expected growth ...
MERTZ ... "I think it was along with our expectations. We figured hops was going to be on the move just because hops have been setting some records in acreage planted and production so it's going to keep moving along and we know the demand cycle is still pretty strong for that commodity so we keep going."
Mertz says the hops grown in all three Northwest states continues to build on the claim as the hops capital of the world ...
MERTZ ... "Looks like we publish about 35 varieties and we had strung for harvest 55,339 is what we estimated in June which was up from 53,282. Oregon was actually just 2 acres difference from year-to-year and Idaho had nice increase. It's at 8,217. That jumped up from 6,993. There's some different varieties and you see a little bit different stuff that's grown and what the major varieties in Oregon compared to say Washington. So, it's interesting how the industry is a little bit different."
Nearly 75-percent of the nation's hops are grown in Washington, 15-percent in Oregon, and 11-percent in Idaho. 60-percent of our hops are exported. On a worldwide scale, the U.S. is number one growing about 40-percent of the world hop supply.
